Thieving Brothers Force a Banker to Die in Terror
(“Stick ’em Up,” Forensic Files)
Joseph and Shannon Agofsky probably didn’t need to commit homicide in order to rob a bank, and they definitely didn’t need to do it in such a sadistic way.
Like villains from a James Bond movie, the brothers bound Dan Short to a chair, tormented him with a cruel claim, and threw him into a lake while he was still alive.
Unlike 007, Short had no chance of escape. The father of two drowned.
Missouri misery. Clearly the perpetrators were heartless, but didn’t they realize that adding murder to their thievery all but guaranteed they’d never exit prison on two feet? (Alvin Bellamy was convicted of multiple armed bank robberies but got out after just eight years because no one died.)
For this week, I looked for any information about the Agofsky brothers’ motives and upbringing that might explain their inhumanity and recklessness. I also searched for some background on Dan Short, whose death stunned Noel, a town of 1,000 people on the Elk River in southwestern Missouri.
A lot has happened since the Forensic Files episode “Stick ’em Up” first aired in 2006, so let’s get going on the recap along with additional information culled from internet research and recent interviews:
Tend to the lens. On Oct. 6, 1989, cashier Pauline Coonrod arrived at the State Bank of Noel to find the door unlocked and the vault open.
Local police and an FBI agent from Joplin found that $71,000 in paper money and 320 pounds of wrapped coins worth $4,000 were missing. On the floor lay two spent 45-caliber shell casings. The robbers had shot out the security camera lens, covered it with spray paint, and tipped it away from the lobby. They left no fingerprints and set off no alarms.
In the aftermath of the heist, no one could find the bank’s president, Dan Short. He had the keys to the front door and access to the vault, which made him a suspect.
Hounds released. After a split with his wife, Dan was having problems adjusting and at times had turned to alcohol, his daughter, Melanie, later told investigators, according to the Swamp Murders episode “Run for the Money.”
Maybe Dan Short was looking for a new, cash-infused start.
County sheriffs coordinated a search effort using tracker dogs and helicopters that flew so low that Noel residents had to raise their voices to talk, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
Secret treasure. And talk they did. The crime was pretty much the only topic of local conversation, according to Gerald E. Elkins, a newspaper reporter who appeared on the Forensic Files episode.
Soon, investigators discovered that the bank had a second, secret vault that only Dan Short had the key for, and it contained $100,000. If he wanted to steal from the bank, why would he leave the extra cash there?
And disarray at his house suggested something bad had happened to him. Someone had rifled through drawers and upended his wastebasket. His glasses, which he always wore, lay on a dresser. The spot where he normally parked his vehicle was empty except for debris— neckties, newspapers, and letters emptied out of the back.
Spouse scrutiny. Police found Dan’s red four-wheel-drive Dodge pickup abandoned at a parking lot for Sibley Industries on Toga Hill Road outside of town. The vehicle had no prints other than Short’s.
At first, the victim’s estranged wife of 23 years, Joyce Short, drew suspicion. Although she’d been a popular and well-respected gym teacher and coach for the Noel public school system, she was also the beneficiary of $200,000 in payouts from Dan’s life insurance policies.
But police found no solid evidence pointing in her direction.
Security upgrades. Joyce, who lived in St. Louis with son Scott while he attended a private high school and Melanie was away at college, defended Dan’s reputation. “He didn’t do drugs. He didn’t gamble. He didn’t associate with rough tough people,” she told an AP reporter.
Despite $75,000 in rewards funded by area banking organizations, “the consensus of people coming in and out of my post office is [the case] will never be solved,” Postmaster Bill Poage told the AP, which also reported that some worried residents installed floodlights around their houses for extra protection.
“After the first day, we had hope,” Dan’s brother Bob Short later told the AP. “Even the second day, we thought that maybe they had just tied him up somewhere.”
Bound for death. On Oct. 11, 1989, five days after the robbery, a couple fishing for bass reported seeing a body floating on Grand Lake in Oklahoma, 21 miles from Noel.
Someone had duct-taped a man to an antique wooden chair, weighted it with a concrete block, attached a 30-pound hoist chain, and dropped it off Cowskin Bridge on Highway 10.
The victim’s wallet ID’ed him as Dan Short, born July 19, 1938.
Good citizen. His murder took a toll on not only his family — Dan remained close to his kids despite the marital woe — but also the community.
Dan started the president job at the State Bank of Noel in 1983, and he also did radio commentary on local sports and served as grand master of Noel’s annual Christmas parade.
When Noel school principal Rocky Macy and friends established a local newspaper, the Elk River Courant, Dan penned sports columns free of charge.
Nice guy remembered. “Dan Short was a great writer,” Macy told ForensicFilesNow.com during a phone interview on Oct. 31, 2020. “He was a very nice guy, and he’d been a guest in my house.”
At Dan’s funeral, some of his columns were read aloud, Macy recalled in his blog.
A TV series titled Lost Cause suggested that Dan might have caused ill feeling in the community because economic problems spurred the bank to repossess some customers’ belongings and decline to provide credit to others.
But a different media account said that Dan was compassionate and would actually bend the rules a bit to help out people in financial need.
Tape-up job. With the victim identified, investigators busied themselves with the forensics.
Authorities released a photo of the spindle-backed death chair in hopes that someone would recognize it.
A lab rejoined the cut-up duct tape.
Well-traveled. Around the same time, concerned citizen Rowdy Foreman picked up a stray piece of tape near Grand Lake and turned it over to police. It fit perfectly with the rest. And remnants of the wooden chair used to bind Dan Short clung to the adhesive.
Police got tips that locals Joe Agofsky, 23, and Shannon Agofsky, 18, had been talking about coming into money.
The brothers had grown up in Noel, and Joe had at one time wanted to become a sheriff’s deputy. Shannon, who stood 6-foot-3-inches tall and liked to keep himself fit, was thinking about a career as a bodyguard, according to Rocky Macy’s blog.
Women to the rescue. At first, the duo seemed to have alibis. Joe’s fiancée, Shayna, and her brother, Lloyd Tuttle, said that Joe was with her at her house in Carterville, Missouri, the night of the robbery.
Likewise, the Agofskys’ mother, Sheila Agofsky Billbe, claimed Shannon was at her house after coming home from teaching a karate class. He wasn’t feeling well and she saw him asleep in his bed around the time of the crime, Sheila said.
The investigation continued for two years. Although discouraged by the wait, local businesses and houses kept yellow ribbons, along with the usual Christmas decorations, on their doors to signify their desire for justice for Dan Short.
Loose lips. Unsolved Mysteries produced a segment about the case and asked for tips. Syndicated series Hard Copy reenacted the crime and solicited help as well.
The Agofskys’ names surfaced again amid more reports that they were throwing a lot of money around. After the bank robbery, both brothers, who were unemployed, purchased cars with cash, according to the FBI Files episode “Blood Brothers.” Shannon reportedly bragged that he was the richest teenager in the country, according to Lost Cause.
Joe had taken Shayna to Disneyland (yes, Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride incentivized a horrific crime) and bought her a ring, Swamp Murders reported.
Unlikely trust-funders. And it turned out that Sheila Agofsky owned a brown-and-tan van like the one a passerby reported seeing on the bridge around the time of Dan Short’s murder. Other witnesses saw the brothers wipe off fingerprints from their bullets before loading their guns and recognized the chain used in the murder as those once seen in Sheila Agofsky’s residence.
Still, at first, there was one big factor that cast doubt on the Agofsky brothers’ involvement: Years earlier, they came into a lot of money honestly.
In 1980, the boys’ father, Joe Agofsky Sr., who worked for Pressure Control Inc., an Oklahoma company that did trouble-shooting for oil rigs, died in a plane crash while returning from a business trip in Mexico. The twin-engine Piper Navajo ran out of fuel, hit the ground, and burned in Soto La Marina, killing all seven people on board, according to newspaper accounts from 1980.
Just out of reach. The boys, ages 9 and 14 at the time of the tragedy, were entitled to trust funds as a result of their father’s death. Joseph Jr. reportedly nabbed $75,000 from his trust.
But Shannon couldn’t get at his payout until he turned 21.
After receiving subpoenas, Joe and Shannon said they had nothing to do with the robbery-murder.
Buddy squeals. Meanwhile, the FBI started leaning on an Agofsky associate named Gant Wesley Sanders, reminding him he had no alibi and threatening him with prison time if he withheld information about the murder-robbery.
Gant, who had gone to high school with Joe and briefly roomed with Shannon, finally cracked in 1990. He said Joe Agofsky had talked about the possibility of kidnapping a bank president and forcing him to open the vault. (Authorities ultimately concluded Gant had nothing to do with the robbery-murder, and he got immunity on a gun charge.)
Police obtained a complete set of fingerprints from Shannon and got a match on the errant piece of duct tape from the crime scene — despite having soaked in water, the tape bore a fingerprint.
Conspicuous consumption. A wiretap picked up Shannon asking Joe if he could face charges on the Short case. Still, authorities needed more evidence tying Joe Agofsky to the crime.
After studying Joe’s financial history, investigators found that he had made $19,000 in cash purchases from Oct. 6, 1989, to Jan. 31, 1991, while he was jobless.
help, Shannon Agofsky
would have gotten away
with murder
His total spending around the time included $800 in cash for a vacation car rental, $44,500 to buy a house and some adjoining land, and an unspecified amount for new furniture.
Bye, bye, alibi. Shannon, the prosecution argued, needed money because he was too old to continue receiving $600 to $800 a month from his late father’s Social Security — but too young to tap into the trust fund.
Meanwhile, Joe’s alibi disintegrated when FBI agent Ladell Farley discovered Joe made long distance phone calls to Shayna’s house during the time of the robbery when he said that he was home with her.
Investigators also discovered that Joe had rented a safe deposit box in the bank, probably to get its floor plan, and asked questions about who the president was and where he lived.
Gant, whose father had helped remodel the bank, said that Joe asked him for the blueprints, the Springfield News-Reader reported.
Anonymous participant. Investigators believed that, before dawn on Oct. 6, 1989, the brothers abducted Dan Short from his house in Sulphur Springs, Arkansas. Dan had two friends over earlier that night, and the Agofskys might have staked out the house and sprung into action as soon as Short’s pals left.
They had already loaded their mother’s brown-and-tan van with equipment needed for the crime.
An unidentified accomplice served as lookout and driver.
Utter inhumanity. The Agofskys made Dan open the outer vault, took the money, abandoned his truck, and carried out their plan to execute him.
Shannon took off one of his gloves while tying Dan Short to the chair, leaving the fingerprints on the duct tape.
John Douvris, a jailhouse informant, would later testify that Shannon claimed to have taunted Dan Short by lowering the chair, then lifting it up again as he begged for his life — and telling Dan that his wife, Joyce, was the one who wanted him dead.
Already caged. When they threw Dan over the side of the bridge, one of the chair legs broke, releasing the piece of tape.
An autopsy proved Dan was still breathing when they tossed him into the water.
Police arrested the Agofsky brothers in March 1992 and charged them with murder. (They didn’t have to look too hard for Shannon; he was incarcerated due to a 1991 conviction for transporting stolen guns.)
Mom on the case. Sheila Agofsky offered a reward to anyone who could help clear her sons of the robbery and murder, but she didn’t specify a dollar amount, according to The Oklahoman.
The trial for robbery kicked off in 1992.
“I’m scared. I’m mad. And I’m in disbelief that it’s gone as far as it has,” Sheila said during jury selection proceedings. Sheila also complained that the jail denied her sons telephone and TV privileges.
Sorry, guys. She claimed that the boys couldn’t have used her van the night of the murder because it had a flat tire and compromised battery.
Yet the prosecution would later produce evidence that Sheila had tried to sell the van in 1989 and said in a newspaper ad that it “runs good.”
After seven-weeks, the trial ended in convictions.
U.S. District Judge Russell Clark sentenced the brothers to life without the possibility of parole plus a concurrent 10 years for conspiracy to commit armed bank robbery and use of a firearm during a violent crime.
A mother’s love. “The system works,” Joyce Short said after the sentencing. “The sunshine feels good on my back.”
The judge also ordered Shannon to pay $71,562.25 in restitution all by himself since Joe Jr. needed what little money he had to support a baby son he shared with Shayna, the Springfield News-Leader reported. Joe used $40,000 from his trust fund to cover legal costs, according to one media account.
Shayna and Sheila Agofsky vowed they would fight on to prove Joe and Shannon’s innocence. In 1993, Sheila pledged to sell her house and a rental property to finance her sons’ defense for the upcoming murder trial.
Spoiling for a fight. Sheila tried a little victim-smearing as well, saying Dan Short’s murder was drug related and that he “knew too much, drank too much, and talked too much,” the Oklahoman.com reported.
Meanwhile, Dan Short’s family and friends had to wait until 1997 before authorities could put together a solid homicide case and pull the trigger on a trial.
But once they did, the prosecution, led by Ben Loring, presented a battalion of witnesses — 60 in all. One of them testified to having seen Joe’s blue pickup truck at Dan Short’s house on the night of the murder.
In denial. And the prosecutors trotted out some high-impact prose. Assistant D.A. Eddie Wyant dubbed the chair used in the murder an “execution contraption.” Assistant U.S. attorney Mike Jones called the fingerprints on the tape a “smoking cannon.”
Defense lawyer Waco Carter produced just three witnesses, including Sheila and the boys’ uncle.
Carter argued that the fingerprint evidence wasn’t wholly intact.
Mechanical dude. Joe’s lawyers, John Woodard and David Autry, put Joe on the witness stand, where he claimed, “I have never considered robbing a bank before, and I never will.”
Joe maintained that he had enough money left from his trust fund to live on. Furthermore, he could make money doing auto-body work from his home if need be.
″We are innocent and we should be allowed to go home to our family where we belong,″ Joe said in court. He accused the FBI and state of fabricating evidence and claimed the judge had it out for the Agofskys.
Blame the bank. Shannon declined to take the stand, but his jailhouse acquaintances were happy to talk.
Wayne Pennington said Shannon had laughed about the murder. John Douvris claimed Shannon planned to murder FBI Agent Ladell Farley and that Shannon even spoke of killing Joe and Shayna because they were both present during the crime. (Shayna was never charged or prosecuted.)
The defense lawyers called the snitches liars and the investigators Keystone Cops. The team also tried to trash the bank’s reputation, alleging it had sloppy procedures and problems with the FDIC. Short’s death was tied to an alleged money-laundering scheme involving his bank, the Agofsky lawyers claimed.
Devil-may-care. Autrey contended that the prosecution’s case didn’t make sense because Short’s body surfaced upstream — rather than downstream — of the bridge.
Defense lawyer Richard Anderson implored the jury not to “do damage to your souls” by ignoring any reasonable doubt.
Another defense lawyer, Debbie Maddox, instructed Shannon — who managed to look pleasant and unthreatening throughout the trial — to turn his chair toward the jury members. She asked them to gaze into his innocent-looking eyes, and implored, “I beg you, I invite you to stare him down.”
Aggrieved family speaks. She held onto Shannon’s arm when the jury returned with the guilty verdict against him.
According to Tulsa World, Shannon’s “ever-present friendly expression remained unchanged.” He turned to his family and assured them that everything would be all right.
But there was more adversity in store for Shannon before the sentencing.
During the victim impact statements, multiple members of Dan Short’s family spoke of experiencing the same nightmare in which they heard Dan begging for his life.
Run-on sentence. Dan’s daughter, Melanie, was particularly emotional. “For the rest of my life, I will always have bittersweet feelings about such things as cutting a Christmas tree or watching a Cardinals game,” she tearfully told the court.
Shannon said he had no regrets about the murder because he didn’t commit it and asked spectators to think of him if someday one of their loved ones was unjustly accused.
He received another life sentence for the murder.
Why the brutality? Without forensic evidence placing Joe at the murder scene, the jury couldn’t agree on a verdict. Prosecutors didn’t try Joe again because he already had life for the bank robbery.
No one ever indisputably ID’ed the third accomplice.
Despite all the media coverage before, during, and after the murder, one question remained: What turned two middle-class brothers into ritualistically savage killers?
Dark matriarch. A longtime Noel resident who knew the Agofskys — and asked to remain anonymous because of safety concerns — told ForensicFilesNow.com that Sheila Agofsky indulged her sons in a way that probably shaped a narcissistic criminality.
“I’m sure if anytime there was an issue of authority, Sheila would say to her sons, ‘you don’t have to listen to them,”’ the source said. “She was mean as a snake and very smart. Shannon was very bright, too. I think Shannon would have been the boss and Joe would have been the assistant” in the robbery-murder.
Apparently, the Agofsky brothers felt confident that they could get away with anything and saw Dan Short’s murder as cinematic fun.
Not a pen pal. Indeed, even behind bars, Shannon wasn’t done killing.
In 2001, at the U.S. Penitentiary at Beaumont, Texas, Shannon and another prisoner shared an exercise cage where the prison apparently allowed inmates to fight — but not to the death.
Shannon, who had training in martial arts, stomped down on Luther Plant’s head and neck.
It’s all on tape. A video camera recorded the attack, which showed Plant “as he died, with his arms and legs twitching, his face bloody and mangled,” according to an AP account.
Plant, who was serving 15 years for arson and gun charges, drowned in his own blood.
Facebook page
After three days of deliberation, a jury convicted Shannon in 2004, rejecting his claims of self-defense. Again, Shannon showed no emotion upon hearing a guilty finding.
He received a death sentence.
Social-media presence. Shannon has not been executed and resides in the U.S. Penitentiary at Terre Haute, Indiana, as of this writing.
He has a Facebook page, although it hasn’t been updated since 2013. An innocence website for him posted as recently as 2018.
Older brother Joe Agofsky died of natural causes in a North Carolina federal prison at the age of 46 on March 5, 2013.
That’s all for this post. Until next time, cheers. — RR
Watch the episode on YouTube
